Maybe a task seems insurmountable at first. It’s huge and daunting and, from a distance, seems unable to be scaled until you begin the ascent. You place one foot in front of the other and slowly make progress up something that, just recently, was “impossible”.

Okay, the ascent sucks. Your legs are sore, you’re sweating, you’re all out of CLIF Bars and beef jerky, the wind is whipping, the weird chick you met on Tinder is just complaining the entire way up, but you’re making progress. You make it to the top and the view is breath-taking, You saw some really fuckin’ majestic bald eagles or you caught a sunrise/sunset or you’ve been intentionally holding on to tree branches and letting them whip back and hit that annoying Tinder match. You’ve seen some cool shit. You now have a story. A memory. Maybe during the playing out of that story or memory you experienced some struggle, but looking back, you had an adventure and that’s what matters.

Looking for different routes up. Most mountains have multiple routes to the summit. Look at it from different angles, just like life. Don’t be narrow-minded. Be open to all angles and perspectives. Maybe look for a different route up the mountain.

Sometimes mountains are filled with assholes. Those assholes that leave trash on the trail, or take massive shits two feet from the trail, or worse, shit ON the trail. These assholes only care about themselves and take the mountain for granted. Don’t be that asshole.

I would say the summit of the mountain is the climax and just like in life, the climax is usually the best part. Keyword usually.

It’s not about what you have. We’ve all seen the people hiking that look like they just came from an Urban Outfitters. Their boots don’t have dirt on them, they look like they spent a couple of hours modeling in the mirror before hitting the trailhead. They’re hiking a ten thousand footer in July in Colorado but they have an ice axe with them because they think it looks good. Good memories aren’t going to come from all of the Gucci gear you’re out there with, good memories will come from the awesome people you do it with. Good, trustworthy friends and/or belayer will always be more important to me than some new high-tech gear.